Was Parnell Defense hit by ransomware?

Parnell Defense was listed by the hunters ransomware operation (United States), and stolen data was published on the group's leak site. Darkfield tracks this disclosure with the original leak post, screenshot and group context.

Who is the hunters ransomware group?

hunters is a ransomware operator tracked by Darkfield. See the full operator dossier for its known victims, sectors targeted, IOCs and leak-site infrastructure.

What data was leaked in the Parnell Defense breach?

hunters published data attributed to Parnell Defense. Darkfield captured the leak post and a screenshot of the listing.

Ransomware victim disclosure

← All victims

Parnell Defense, PLLC

listed as Parnell Defense · Claimed by Hunters · listed 2 years ago

21m

Age

since listed · data leaked

Status timeline

ListedOct 15, 2024
Data leakeddate unknown

At a glance

Group: Hunters
Status: Data leaked
Country: United States
Sector: Business Services
Listed on leak site: Oct 15, 2024

About the victim

AI dossier — public-source company profile

Parnell Defense, PLLC is a private criminal law practice founded by attorney Schöen Parnell, specializing in firearm offenses, self-defense cases, restoration of gun rights, and criminal record sealing/vacation. Based in Lynnwood, Washington, the firm operates as a solo practice with the principal attorney directly handling client cases.

Industry: Criminal Defense Law Firm
Address: Lynnwood, Washington, United States

Attack summary

Severity: high — Exfiltration of criminal law firm data exposes attorney-client privileged communications and sensitive personal information of criminal defendants, likely including minors and individuals with prior convictions. This constitutes regulated/sensitive data exposure with significant privacy and legal implications.

The hunters group claims to have exfiltrated data from Parnell Defense without encrypting systems. No details on specific data types or operational disruption are provided in the leak post.

high

Data the group says was taken

AI dossier — extracted from the leak post

Client case files
Attorney-client communications
Personal identifying information
Legal strategy documents
Financial records

What the group claims

Country : United States of America - Exfiltraded data : yes - Encrypted data : no

Sources

Victim siteparnelldefense.com
Leak posthttps://hunters55rdxciehoqzwv7vgyv6nt37tbwax2reroyzxhou7my5ejyid.onion/companies/3229778073

Source

Indexed 2 years ago

This page surfaces a public ransomware disclosure indexed by Darkfield. Original posts come from the operator's own leak site; we cross-check against ransomware.live, RansomLook and RansomWatch where applicable. Share this URL freely.

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Disclosure context

About hunters

Hunters International is a ransomware group first observed in October 2023 that operates with primary financial motivations, having claimed responsibility for attacks against at least 307 known victims across a broad range of sectors and geographies. The group is believed to have acquired the source code and infrastructure of the defunct Hive ransomware operation following Hive's disruption by law enforcement in January 2023, though Hunters International has publicly disputed characterizations that it is a direct Hive rebrand, asserting instead that it independently purchased the codebase; the group operates as a Ransomware-as-a-Service model, recruiting affiliates to conduct intrusions on its behalf. Hunters International employs double extortion tactics, exfiltrating victim data prior to encryption and threatening public release on a dedicated leak site to increase pressure on victims to pay; initial access vectors observed across reported incidents include phishing, exploitation of publicly exposed remote services, and credential abuse, with the group deploying its Rust-based encryptor derived from Hive's codebase. The group has demonstrated a notably indiscriminate targeting pattern, with victims concentrated in the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, France, and Germany spanning Business Services, Manufacturing, Technology, Healthcare, and Energy sectors, reflecting a financially opportunistic rather than strategically selective approach; no single landmark ransom payment or named high-profile campaign has been singularly attributed to the group in major public reporting as of available documentation. As of the most recent publicly available threat intelligence reporting, Hunters International remains an active and operational ransomware threat with a growing victim count and no confirmed law enforcement disruption or rebranding. The group has been linked to 307 public disclosures across our corpus. First observed on a leak site on October 20, 2023; most recent post May 27, 2025. The operation is currently inactive.

Also tracked as: Hunters International.

Timeline of this disclosure

October 15, 2024Parnell Defense listed by hunterson the group's public leak site

Other recent disclosures by hunters

hunters has been linked to 307 public victims on Darkfield. A sample of the most recent:

See the full hunters dossier →

Sector and geography

This disclosure adds to ransomware activity in the Business Services sector, which has 3,796 disclosures indexed across all operators we track. Geographically, Parnell Defense is reported in United States, a country with 3,138 ransomware disclosures in our corpus.

If your organisation is affected

A listing by hunters means Parnell Defense appeared on a ransomware extortion site and data attributed to it has been published. If this is your organisation, or a supplier you depend on, the priority is to confirm the intrusion and contain it before the window to act closes.

Engage your incident-response team and preserve forensic evidence before remediating — do not wipe affected systems first.
Force a password reset and revoke active sessions for exposed accounts; rotate any credentials, API keys or certificates that may have been in the stolen data.
Assess regulatory notification duties (GDPR, NIS2, sector regulators) — many carry a 72-hour reporting clock from awareness.
Report the incident to your national CERT, CISA (United States), as required for your jurisdiction.
Monitor for the data appearing on hunters's leak site and across paste and breach channels, and brief downstream partners who may be exposed through you.

How we know this. Darkfield monitors public ransomware leak sites continuously, archiving every new disclosure and the data later released against the victim. Each entry on this page is sourced from the operator's own publication and cross-checked against complementary OSINT feeds (RansomLook, ransomware.live, RansomWatch). We do not collect or host stolen data — only the metadata, timestamps and screenshots needed to make the public disclosure searchable and accountable. Records here are corrected when the original post is edited, retracted, or merged with another disclosure.